


Never Had Nobody Like You

by Neo



Category: Glee
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-15
Updated: 2010-07-15
Packaged: 2017-11-11 16:54:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/480734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neo/pseuds/Neo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Finn tries and fails to describe his relationship with Kurt. Repeatedly. No, really. <i>Repeatedly.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Never Had Nobody Like You

The Hummels and Hudsons become the Hummel-Hudsons when Kurt is seventeen. It's not really official yet—their parents claim they intend to wait another year before tying the knot—but it's just easier to think of them that way when they're all under the same roof, trying to make room for each other in all their awkward spaces.

Finn doesn't go to the basement too often, partly because the smell of Kurt's bath products when he has them all uncapped or open makes him sneeze uncontrollably and partly because Kurt and Sam spend a considerable amount of time making out. But they manage to intersect at breakfasts and dinners, elbowing each other in the hallway and between dates. 

Finn's about to meet Rachel's parents, so tonight Kurt's the one who gets to enjoy sitting on the chaise lounge in his socks watching while Finn putters around panicking about how much is too much Drakkar Noir and whether it's too much to borrow Burt's cufflinks. 

"I mean," he's saying, "it's not like I'm asking them if I can marry her. Yet. I didn't wear cufflinks to the Fabrays', for crying out loud, and I thought Quinn was having my baby—"

Kurt can't concentrate on _Project Runway_ with Finn freaking out like this. It's a little annoying. It's also a little endearing. "Finn, come here."

Finn makes his way to Kurt, wringing his hands. "Should I bring flowers? For who?"

"No and nobody, that's a tactic you reserve for prom and Valentine's Day dates. Lean down."

Finn obliges, leaning over the side of the lounge. Kurt reaches up and undoes his tie, then starts painstakingly retying it. "Sorry. It was bothering me even at a distance."

Finn glances down at Kurt's hands as they work by his collar, then grins, lopsided. "Thanks, Kurt," he says. "You know, I'm lucky we live in the same house. I'm just kind of letting loose on you and you haven't punched me yet." He pauses thoughtfully. "You're like—the Bert to my Ernie."

"...I think I'm offended, honestly," Kurt says, smoothing down Finn's tie a final time before pulling his hands away.

Finn starts digging around the sofa cushions for his wallet. "I'll think of a better metaphor later," he promises.

He doesn't really, but he tries every day for two weeks, text messaging Kurt with gems of comparisons such as the pair from _The Odd Couple_ and Turner and Hooch. On Saturday Finn texts him with _WERE JOEY AND CHANDLER FROM FRIENDS SECRETLY DOING IT? IF NOT WE CAN BE THOSE GUYS_ in the middle of a groping session with Sam. Kurt cracks up so hard he accidentally tumbles off his sofa and nearly knocks himself out on his coffee table.

* * *

They're eighteen and it's May. McKinley has a senior lock-in after the graduation ceremony, so their parents take them to a fancy diner the night before to get that aspect of the celebrations out of the way.

Their neighbors tag along too, which isn't so bad because they're decent people. But they don't have kids or anything, so Kurt and Finn end up spending most of the night giving each other furtive looks while their parents and the Delaneys have loud and deeply uninteresting grown-up conversations.

"So we're graduating, right, and I was thinking," Finn begins quietly, "about us."

Kurt considers his French toast and the likelihood that this conversation will lead to anything good. "Oh?"

"I think we've come, like, a really long way since this time last year," Finn says. "And don't even get me started on sophomore year. Since Rachel and I..." He frowns, then waves his free hand irritably. "You're pretty much the best thing in my life, and. It's been great." He puts his burger down. "I'm awesome."

Kurt glances up, lips quirked in a smile. "'Awesome,' huh?"

Finn grins back. "Yeah. And that's all you." He glances around. "We—we work. We're like..."

"Oh, boy."

"No, no, this one's good," Finn promises. He picks up one of his jumbo French fries and the ketchup bottle. "Okay, look. You're small and bendy, like this French fry." He waggles the fry for emphasis. Kurt frowns at the sheen of grease on his fingertips. "And _I_ am like this ketchup bottle."

"Containing no actual vegetable content?" Kurt suggests primly.

"Shut up. Anyway! You do fine on your own, y'know, 'cause some people don't dig condiments. They just want the goods." He waves the fry again. "But me, I don't. I need—something." Something glints in his eyes. "And most of the time, that something is something like—"

Kurt isn't really sure what happens. One second he's gesticulating with the smooth neck of the ketchup bottle in a manner that Kurt will very pointedly _not_ think about later; the next the cap is shooting off and the fry in Finn's other hand is being less-than-liberally spattered with red sauce that explodes with bizarre gusto from the mouth of the bottle.

The adults, to their credit, don't even notice.

"Oh my god," Kurt says, unable to tear his eyes away from the dripping fry in Finn's hand.

"... _not planned_ ," Finn croaks. 

"That was—"

Finn's face is white, but slowly starting to turn red from his cheeks to his ears. "Just—forget it, I'll—can we get another ketchup bottle here? Waiter?" 

Then he looks back at the fry in his hand as though he'd forgotten it was there. He flushes even harder and moves to drop it back onto his plate, then seems to think better of it and crams the whole thing into his mouth.

Kurt can't tell what he finds more deeply unsettling—the entirety of what just happened or the smear of ketchup lingering on the corner of Finn's anxious smile.

* * *

They're nineteen. Finn calls once a week for the two solid months leading into finals, usually at sane and normal hours. Not tonight.

"You're like the plot twist to my M. Night Shyamalan movie," Finn breathes.

Kurt pulls the phone away to stare at it disbelievingly, then presses it back to his ear. "Finn. It's four in the morning."

"...it is? I might be drunk."

"I'm sleepy and borderline homicidal. Please don't do this again."

"Right. Um. Night, Kurt."

Kurt covers his eyes with his hand. "Good night, Finn."

* * *

For spring break 2014 Finn's friends are all flying down to Florida to dick around in Panama City Beach, as guys do. Kurt only knows Finn isn't doing this when Finn forwards him a flight itinerary. A flight itinerary that says he'll be headed for JFK on the very Friday night his break starts.

Kurt nearly flips out. His dorm's a single so having a guest isn't a problem in and of itself; the room is just a _mess_ , the likes of which Finn almost never saw in any space belonging to Kurt while they were living together. 

He bails on his study session in order to tidy up, but the knock on the door still comes way too soon. Kurt kicks over the vacuum and is trying to yank off his apron one-handed when he opens the door.

"Hey, you," Finn says, beaming. "What's with the apron?"

Kurt scowls and drops a hand to his hip. "What's with the surprise visit?" he asks. "Not that I'm not thrilled to see you, but I could use more than two days' notice next time."

"Um. New Jersey is awesome? I missed you?"

He sighs. Then he steps aside to let Finn lurch through the doorway. "Both barely acceptable answers. New Jersey is New Jersey and we talk way too much."

Finn drops his bag on the sofa, then turns around and drops his hands onto Kurt's shoulders in lieu of a hug. "You're happy to see me, don't lie," he says earnestly.

Kurt sniffs and tries not to feel the smile tugging at his lips. "I already said I was thrilled—"

"Gonna take me awesome places?"

"I have flash cards to finish. Some of us still have school, you know."

Finn beams down at him. "I can wait," he says. His fingers catch on the collar of Kurt's shirt. Kurt's huffy, but he has to sneak a glance up at the way Finn's eyes go soft. "This has been a long time coming, anyway."

Kurt looks away again. "What has?"

"...me coming to visit, of course," Finn says in one breath, flopping onto the sofa. "I brought my laptop anyway. Get studying. I've waited this long to see you, I can wait another couple hours."

Kurt feels a surge of irrational annoyance. He doesn't speak.

Finn's pulls out his laptop bag and runs his mouth all the while anyway. "I mean, I know there's plenty to sightsee by myself, but like. Okay. Picture me as a fat kid."

"Done."

Finn clutches his chest, aghast. " _Ow._ " Then he opens up his netbook and taps the power button. "New Jersey and NYC are like...the two chocolate sides of an Oreo. They've got these kinda cool designs and are super rich and you can't really just bypass them. But no one really eats an Oreo for the chocolate bits." He points at Kurt with his pinky. "You're the cream filling!"

Kurt stares.

Finn reddens and logs onto Facebook. "Also, you're seasonally hip. Like how during Easter they release those ones with the yellow filling."

"You seriously just told me I had the allure of an overprocessed Nabisco cookie to an obese youth."

Finn glances up in alarm as Kurt advances on him with a throw pillow. "Okay, no, you are totally missing the— _mmmph_!"

* * *

> **from** Finn Hudson  <fhudsonnnnn@gmail.com>  
>  **to** Kurt Hummel  <khummel@gmail.com>  
>  **date** Fri, February 6, 2015 at 8:22 PM  
>  **subject** so i know by now this is starting to freak you out a little
> 
> i've never been too hot with words obviously and i know you're busy studying in london or wherever (i forgot which city and the postcards you sent fell under the fridge, tom and i are gonna fish em out later) and i know you're asleep but i kinda wanted to call you like a lot 
> 
> i can't afford that phone charge - internatl long distance hell to the no - and i don't wanna ask your dad for $ so like

> **from** Finn Hudson  <fhudsonnnnn@gmail.com>  
>  **to** Kurt Hummel  <khummel@gmail.com>  
>  **date** Fri, February 6, 2015 at 8:28 PM
> 
> i know we go to diff schools anyway so you being in another country is pretty much the same thing but you're still my favorite person who is mostly on the east coast and i just wanted to say i miss you :-D

> **from** Finn Hudson  <fhudsonnnnn@gmail.com>  
>  **to** Kurt Hummel  <khummel@gmail.com>  
>  **date** Sat, February 7, 2015 at 1:50 AM
> 
> but yeah the point is rachel called yesterday morning and said she missed me and was gonna be in-state all week. it sounds perfect. she's still perfect. and what did i do? i told her i had a thing and hung up on her way too fast and i've been kinda weird since. her voice still gives me chills. and it's hard to talk to people here about this bc they don't know her and they don't know who she was to me. she was my north star. and i don't wanna put you through this talk again so i'll just stop there
> 
> talking with her just reminded me not even of the time i spent with her, just how miserable i was when we broke up. you kept patting my back over the blankets and pretended like you couldn't hear me crying like a wuss. when i think about it by now we've had each others backs for a really long time. and i know we spend most of our time apart and all but the point of this email isn't actually rachel, i swear
> 
> it's that i realize i'm better when i keep you close. we're like trees. where the roots grow together and then the leaves and flowers fall off and surprise, its just one tree now. tall.
> 
> and i would take that, always, over freezing my balls off looking for some goddamn candle in a window.

> **from** Kurt Hummel  <khummel@gmail.com>  
>  **to** Finn Hudson  <fhudsonnnnn@gmail.com>  
>  **date** Sat, February 7, 2015 at 2:01 AM  
>  **subject** Re:
> 
> It's seven in the morning, Finn. You need to keep up with what time zone I'm in. 
> 
> I'll call you when you get up.

* * *

At twenty-two they go back to Lima for a few weeks in the summer, before their respective leases run out and they have to go looking for new places to live. Burt and Carole throw their sons a mini-party to welcome them home, but retire early because they've still got work in the morning. Finn's wired, though, and while Kurt isn't drunk after one Silverlake Slip, he slept the whole flight here and has energy to spare. 

They end up taking a walk to the playground at the edge of the neighborhood, laughing and stumbling, Finn's eyes bright and focused. Kurt perches on a swingset; Finn, as expected, goes for the most juvenile activity in the vicinity.

"We're kinda like birds," Finn says abruptly, swinging upside-down from the monkey bars. He's gotten slimmer since graduation. "We migrate, we come back." He grins. "You'd be a peacock."

Kurt has to smile, even though he knows where this is headed and his face is starting to hurt. "Oh?"

"I read about them on the internet," he says, gesticulating. "Dude peacocks have that crazy plumage that they bust out to woo the ladies. And the ladies look kinda dull."

Kurt hums and tips his head. "Are you calling yourself a girl?"

Finn hesitates.

"You never had to try that hard," he says finally. His voice is trying too hard to be dismissive. "For me to think you're—um. Awesome."

Kurt buries his face in his hand. _We will be doing this until our respective midlife crises unless somebody does something_ , he thinks.

"You okay?" Finn says quietly.

Kurt stands up. Treads the playground carefully until he's near the monkey bars, where Finn's head sways an unsettling four feet off the ground. Crouches, careful to keep his knees off the sand—these are three-hundred-dollar jeans—

Kisses him, slow and careful.

His shocked breath whispers across Kurt's mouth. It feels a little like a miracle, honestly. 

Kurt doesn't open his eyes. He's had this thin thread of hope for so long that having it finally severed is an affair he can't seem to suffer with all his senses. "Please tell me that's what you've been trying to say," he says.

Finn touches the corner of his mouth.

"...yeah," Finn says. "That's perfect."

Kurt can feel himself smiling again. His face still hurts, but it actually feels pretty alright now. It's a good hurt. "You're ineloquent to an extent that I should by all rights find horrifying. You took six years to make a point I established in ten seconds." He tilts his head again. "Anything else you want to build toward for a similarly ridiculous amount of time?"

Finn's hands awkwardly slide over Kurt's jawline. The blood is rushing to his face, making the tips of his ears glow in the fading sunlight. "I—think I might love you," he stammers.

Kurt has to kiss him again. Has to. "That's good," he murmurs, warm everywhere. "That was a good place to start."


End file.
